Life cycle assessment (LCA) was established as a scientific methodology for measuring a product's exchanges with the environment. LCA was established by a committee of global environmental scientists working within the framework of the International Organization for Standardization (IS). Their work resulted in three ISO standards currently in broad global use: (1) standard 14040 for establishing core principles of LCA methodology, (2) standard 14044 for determining processes for developing LCAs, and (3) standard 14025 for setting requirements for development of Type III eco-labels called Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs). The standard for EPDs was released by ISO in 2006 to provide specifiers and purchasers of types of products and services with relevant performance information on a particular product in one source, with that information verified as complete by an independent expert.
EPDs are based on an ISO-compliant full LCA that has been verified by an outside LCA practitioner as meeting the data collection and calculation processes set forth in Product Category Rules (PCRs) for a relevant product type. EPDs provide scientifically robust and transparent information on performance aspects of products or services. To use the term EPD, a report must meet the requirements set forth in standard 14025 of the ISO. The three core requirements of standard 14025 are that: (1) PCRs that are peer-reviewed and expert-approved are used as the framework for developing an LCA, (2) the resulting LCA is reviewed by an independent party expert to determine that it was developed in alignment with requirements of relevant PCRs for scope of data, measurement units, and data calculation processes, and (3) the resulting EPD report is (i) signed and verified by an independent expert as providing relevant performance information, and (ii) registered in an EPD program operated in accordance with ISO Standard 14025.
As explained in standard 14025, “{t}ype III environmental declarations present quantified environmental information on the life cycle of a product to enable comparisons between products fulfilling the same function. Such declarations are provided by one or more organizations, are: based on independently verified life cycle assessment (LCA) data, life cycle inventory analysis (LCI) data or information modules in accordance with the ISO 14040 series of standards and, where relevant, additional environmental information, are developed using predetermined parameters, and are subject to the administration of a programme operator, such as a company or a group of companies, industrial sector or trade association, public authorities or agencies, or an independent scientific body or other organization.”
Additional helpful descriptions can be found at www.environdec.com and are reproduced below:
“{a}n EPD is a standardized (ISO 14025/TR) and LCA based tool to communicate the environmental performance of a product or system, and is applicable worldwide for all interested companies and organizations.
{An EPD} . . . includes information about the environmental impacts associated with a product or service, such as raw material acquisition, energy use and efficiency, content of materials and chemical substances, emissions to air, soil and water and waste generation. It also includes product and company information.
An {EPD} presents quantified environmental information for products or services based on information from a LCA conducted according to the ISO-standards for LCA. EPD is voluntarily developed information and the purpose is to provide quality-assured and comparable information regarding environmental performance of products.”
EPDs are scientifically robust in that the information that they provide has been generated using accepted scientific methodologies established by environmental scientists serving in workgroups that were created and managed by ISO. EPDs are transparent in that the PCRs on which they are based are readily accessible, and the resulting LCAs are given a critical review for completeness, comparability and transparency by experts with demonstrated knowledge of LCA methodologies and practical knowledge of the relevant industry.
While EPDs are considered by experts in product evaluation to provide substantive and transparent bases for performance evaluation of a product or service, not all products and services have registered EPDs. For many products, the only information that is available and that is verified by an independent expert is that a product or service has met the benchmarks to be certified to a given standard. That given standard's eco-label may therefore be used. In ISO terms, this is a Type 1 eco-label. Its certification may lack grounding in ISO standards and/or transparency as to what data was collected and as to how the data was assessed and used to meet a given certification level. That environmental and other performance information may be certified by differing standards, each with a different basis (as opposed to all being ISO-based), and the details of each of these standards is not readily known or recognized across industries and in multiple countries. Consequently, the information that such certifications impart can be of limited use.